Duncan or Mazzone? Who would you rather have?

Duncan. It must be tough to work with Maddux, Glavine, Smoltz, etc...

Mustache versus Edgar Winter hair? It's a tough call.

his kid doesn't look like him at all. do they run the same way, or have a similar swing?

Knowing what we know now why doesn't any of the writers looking to point fingers look at Duncan?

--PEDs history on club, check

--surprising years from previously pedestrian careers, check

--injury breakdowns after a few years, check

It fits the "tells" everyone claims to "know".

I don't understand why TLR and Co. are exempt from questions.

I don't understand why TLR and Co. are exempt from questions.

TLR's too busy sleeping in his car to be bothered with questions.

Yeah, because nobody has disproportionately accused TLR of being the game's #1 steroid enabler even though it's now clear that PED use was prevalent among all 30 ballclubs and Tony's club is nowhere near the top of the leaderboard for PED suspensions.

Oh wait. A lot of people have.

It's a good thing Tony invented that undetectable PED that he's used to make Schumaker, Molina, Ludwick, Wellemeyer, Lohse, Looper, and McClellan perform so much better than expected this year, huh Harvey?

Dr.:

Good one.

But seriously, one COULD associate TLR with tolerating PEDs for 20 years. And helped, ahem, how many vet pitchers get "back on track".

Nobody else finds this curious?

Look, if folks are going to ask questions why not ask where the markers we claim to "know" actually exist.

Cards fans will claim I "hate" Tony. No. I just think everybody merits a looksee.

Which undetectable PED do you mean? HGH? Or one of the others?

SP:

I am "calling out" the uneven nature of the finger pointers.

And I am referring to Tony/Chris entire resume.

Crispix, there are a couple of problems with that:

1. hGH doesn't help. This has been covered pretty exhaustively, but it bears repeating until people start listening: Edematous muscles aren't helping any athlete perform better.
2. Ignoring the fact that it doesn't enhance performance, if hGH is so cheap and easy to get away with using that the majority of folks on the Cardinals who are getting by on the major league minimum are loading up on it and playing at or near All Star levels, why isn't the rest of the league?

Harvey, everyone knows you hate Tony. You become incredibly irrational whenever the subject swings to Tony. You're not going to change anyone's minds on this when you jump on every mention of Tony or his staff to wonder why nobody is accusing him of PED enabling, when Donald Fehr and Bud Selig are the only non-players who have been blamed more for PED use in baseball.

And SP, are you honestly of the belief that "coaching" took a guy with a career .502 slugging percentage in the minors over thousands of at bats and made him Albert's twin?

I am FINE with Ludwick using. But just be honest about it and not claim, as he does, that it's because he's healthy.

Don't insult us.

I mean please. Enough

It doesn't enhance your performance, maybe.

It seems to enhance eyesight, for example. This is anecdotal, of course.

I was just pointing out that the concept of an "undetectable" PED is in no way unlikely. I'm not agreeing with anything Harveys is saying here.

harvey:

off the top of my head, i seem to remember mulder didnt exactly set the world on fire, then fell off a cliff, this after he got to st. louis.

carpenter had an elbow reconstruction before this bout, so he has a history that isn't surprising.

what are these markers of?

i guess my question would be who in the cards recent history conforms to your hypothetical profile? i'm not trying to pick a fight, just want to know.

I am FINE with Ludwick using. But just be honest about it and not claim, as he does, that it's because he's healthy.

Congrats on hitting a new low.

as far as ludwick, i'll let cfb weigh in on this, but the dude had a broken hip for god's sake, and he played on it. you don't come back from that in a couple of weeks. he has had some freak injuries.

I had several elements of that last post lost in the cut/paste where my overt sarcasm is lost. Leaving it look like I am accusing Ludwick.

The point was supposed to be how his year should be drawing accusatory fingers as it has with other players.

SP:

See last post.

You are missing the point.

In the climate where so many folks "claim" to know I have yet to see an article reviewing Tony's entire career. Oakland and St. Louis.

If you have one link I will be surprised.

People aren't pointing fingers because the one supposed PED that people know of that isn't being tested for doesn't help.

Ludwick is really not a good example, btw. His power has always been a plus tool and the minor league numbers that you cite really need some context. He made it to the major leagues as a 23 year old 3 years out of college with a career .500 SLG despite playing in pitcher's parks, then spent a few years playing on broken bones before finally spending his first healthy year in another pitcher's park in 2006 (.266/.342/.506) and then a neutral park in '07 (.340/.380/.642). Yeah, his May was anomalous even taking into account he's got more talent than most people believed coming into the year, but people have great months.

All I want is accountability. It seems everyone in leadership has been given a "pass".

SP:

A reasonable explanation.

Again, I want consistency. Fairly or unfairly the question needs to be posed.

Otherwise, the whole thing was a farce.

You want accountability, from the one manager you've decided needs to swing for the PED era.

Who just happens to manage a divisional rival.

Ignoring the fact that this was a league-wide issue.

Nobody has written an article reviewing every player who has played for Tony and making wholesale accusations of PED use, but plenty of people have just casually made him the designated managerial pariah and assumed his proximity to McGwire and Canseco is all the evidence for it they need.

yawn

In the climate where so many folks "claim" to know I have yet to see an article reviewing Tony's entire career. Oakland and St. Louis.

And Chicago. Pudge Fisk turned into The Incredible Hulk.

SP:

I challenge you to e-mail 100 baseball columnists. If ONE of them responds with anything CLOSE to your distinction I will be stunned. It is all the same to them.

Nobody in the media has any level of sophistication in this area as you describe.

am i invisible? looking for actual names to go with harvey's hypothetical.

after a quick look at some rosters, pitchers with good years in stl who otherwise were not so good:

marquis
williams
morris
simontacchi

these guys were users?

what hitters have turned in big years in stl and nowhere else? again, i'm just curious.

SP:

Well, I have listed plenty of other front office folks. And managers.

Tony is a good place to start because:

--guys known to have used on his teams

--history of generating "surprising" years from players believed to be on the way out due to injury or other reasons

--history of abuse problems on clubs. Abuse of one substance correlates strongly to abuse elsewhere

This is just common sense.

Cards fans believe I have a vendetta. I do. It's against MLB giving every manager and GM a "pass".

Tony is just the first guy on the list to ask questions for the reasons outlined above.

You are a smart person. If you are going to claim my logic is "irrational" then I need to know what I am missing.

phred:

First, I struggle to hold multiple discussions.

Second, had dogs to feed.

Using the "frame of reference" provided by the "experts" in these matters who are eager to point fingers at players. Here are the position players who elevated under TLR:

Lankford. May seem irrational because we both know Ray had the ability. But he set slugging highs under Tony and stayed in the lineup. And this after a few years of disappointment. Look, I know injuries were a factor. Again, I am using the "standard" put forth by the folks determined to pin blame on the players alone.

DeShields. Came off a year of 60 OPS+ (60? Yes, 60) to get back over 100 with the Cards.

Vina. Who was also named in the Mitchell report. Fernando was done, as in D-O-N-E when he left Milwaukee. He was Junior Spivey the Elder. And managed to get it back for a bit with St. Louis.

And those are just from memory. I remember the DeShields OPS number from another discussion. I didn't want to "cheat" by looking at BBREF.

I will repeat AGAIN. If someone wanted to build a completely hearsay, conjecture "case" against TLR it's possible.

As you could for a LOT of managers.

Why this doesn't happen disappoints me. Because if we are going to cast a net cast it over EVERYONE.

So if it will make folks happy pick another manager with as many "tells". And I will use him as my whipping boy on this topic........

I challenge you to e-mail 100 baseball columnists. If ONE of them responds with anything CLOSE to your distinction I will be stunned. It is all the same to them.

Um, pass. I'd rather just go with Google:

torre steroids: 137,000 results
"bobby cox" steroids: 57,900 results
larussa steroids: 51,400 results
"dusty baker" steroids: 41,200 results
francona steroids: 38,400 results
piniella steroids: 33,600 results
hargrove steroids: 24,000 results
scioscia steroids: 11,200 results
"art howe" steroids: 3,550 results
"don baylor" steroids: 2,380 results

By the way:

"joe torre": 1,620,000 results
"tony la russa": 331,000 results
"bobby cox": 284,000 results

I guess you could make the case that Bobby Cox has born the brunt also, though when I actually read some of the articles on the first few pages of that search they didn't seem to be nearly as accusatory as the La Russa links.

Because if we are going to cast a net cast it over EVERYONE.

And let God sort them out.

Who puts a space in TLR's last name? That seems really odd to me.

And I have done the same thing. And it comes up with a lot of bloggers. But I haven't come across a "regular" print media person making the suggestion.

Seriously, if you have one I would be interested.

gb:

Only some have appointed themselves "god" on the topic. And are practicing segregation. Meaning players go in one door and the other baseball folks another.......

His name does have a space. Strangely, the search "larussa steroids" included pages where his name had the space in it, but "tony la russa" returned about 3 times as many pages as "tony larussa."

harvey,

of COURSE the entire "investigation" was a total piece of **** which was done to

1 - shut up congress
2 - prove that everything was ENTIRELY the players fault - to give the owners more strength at the next CBA

you said

All I want is accountability. It seems everyone in leadership has been given a "pass".

you are correct. completely.

and, in case you didn't notice, the media doesn't care. the media already has it in for the players because they make all that money and screw blond strippers with huge boobs and they don't. why on earth that makes the media side with billionaire owners i do not get.

but trouble with you is that you actually really believe that people in command are responsible for the behaviour of there team (look at how you talk about minaya/randolph and melvin/yost) and that managers should actually, you know, manage

you believe in responsibility and accountability

and basically no one else does. like i said to my mother a long time ago about my brother - the **** you didn't know my brother was drinking/doing drugs. you are NOT stupid. you didn't WANT to know...

the media is only interested in bringing down the 2 superstars to show that because they didn't kiss media ass, they goin DOWN... and the fans? as long as the drug user didn't break babe ruth's records, they just don't care

Incidentally, I thought a little more about this out in the pool. I don't know of a single Duncan "success story" in St. Louis who has actually had his velocity improve. Some of them learned a new pitch (Benes), some of them credited Duncan with improving their pitching gameplan (Williams, Morris), and some of them just benefited from defensive support and a stronger bullpen behind them (Too numerous to mention). I don't know about his days in Oakland, but he has never had a reputation as a guy able to squeeze the last bit of velocity or movement out of pitchers so I imagine it was the same there.

I think we both know it's a pretty sketchy case you can make against La Russa by mentioning that Lankford hit a few extra HRs a year right around age 30 or that Delino Deshields had a small bounceback to his established level of play in his prime years. You can try to use the Craig Paquettes, So Taguchis, and such against him, but then you're left trying to explain why they immediately stopped juicing after they left La Russa's team and how part-time players are still trouncing projections under him this year. The simplest solution is that Tony really does know how to match up his players.

SP:

Well, those were from memory. And then you have the guys like a Jim Edmonds who went from good to "wow" with rumors swirling around him. And then the guys actually "branded" like Mac, Vina and Ankiel.

The part-time players have so limited at bats that can easily be attributed to the ups and downs of being a utility player. Bill Schroeder hit .332 one year for heaven's sake.

Anyway, as I have stated repeatedly it's all hearsay and conjecture. But since some folks are so d*mn quick to point at the guys on the field I deem it only appropriate to look at everyone involved in the action.

And I do NOT believe ANY manager who claims they didn't know. Especially the good ones. Not Torre. Not Cox. No TLR. These guys know the pulse of their clubhouses but can't tell when an outside influence is affecting the game on the field? Bah.

Out by the pool? High living there................

And then you have the guys like a Jim Edmonds who went from good to "wow" with rumors swirling around him.

That's a neat rhetorical device, since the rumors stemmed from him going from goood to "wow". Well, aside from the gay rumors on Cubs message boards, that is. Edmonds started hitting within a ####ing week of arriving in St. Louis, so if it was the juice, there's a good chance he started before he became a Cardinal.

I don't doubt La Russa's steroids policy has been "Don't ask, don't tell."

I don't doubt La Russa's steroids policy has been "Don't ask, don't tell."

What manager's wasn't?

What manager's wasn't?

And isn't that really Harveys larger point? Why are the game's players being the sole scapegoats in this, when managers and GMs were either encouraging or looking the other way about usage. TLR just makes an easy jumping off point because of a) a history with players we know used and b) the fact that unlike all but Torre and Cox, he basically was employed throughout the entire era.

The problem with Harv's point, in my eyes, is that he is accusing TLR of something beyond "don't look, don't tell." For his scenario, in which players come to the Cards and immediately improve in ways players on other teams rarely do, then he's saying he thinks that TLR is peddling the stuff and going into bathroom stalls to inject roids into butts as a matter of policy.

I don't see it.

Vina. Who was also named in the Mitchell report. Fernando was done, as in D-O-N-E when he left Milwaukee. He was Junior Spivey the Elder. And managed to get it back for a bit with St. Louis.

...What?

Vina had a career year with Milwaukee in 1998, with a 114 OPS+ and 22 stolen bases. He only played 37 games with a 72 OPS+ in 1999 due to injury, before rebounding with OPS+ of 96 and 100 his next two years with St. Louis. So you're basically saying he was "done" and needed La Russa-provided steroids to save his career because of 37 bad games. But "37 games" even overstates the case--through his first 26 games in '99, he was hitting .324/.405/.407, before hitting .130/.167/.152 the rest of the way. So the case that he was "done" rests entirely, as far as I can tell, on 11 bad games he had while he was fighting injuries.